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Demonetisation update 28 – industrial outlook

RBI had released its Quarterly Industrial Outlook (Survey No. 76) yesterday. It is not good news for the economy or for the government.

Table 8: Employment Outlook: deterioration

Table 12: Those who expect ‘cost of finance’ to decrease jumped – that is the only positive thing.

Tables 13, 14 and 15: Not good.

Tables 16 and 18: Summary – not good

On top of these, there is GST uncertainty coming up for businesses. There is one more potential uncertainty lurking. That is more taxation – hidden or overt.

As for the budget, if a variant of UBI were adopted, to finance it, tax terrorism (before jumping on me, please note that the phrase was first used by Mr. Jaitley to refer to UPA) and inspector raj could be further boosted.

The bureaucracy is risk-averse and biased towards more control, oversight and taxation. That is why I feel that the GST rates have been fixed at a higher level than they should be.

Finding revenues through unleashing economic activity does not come naturally to them or does not come at all.